In 1961, President Eisenhower delivered his now famous farewell address, in which he warned the American people of the dangerous rise of a powerful “military industrial complex” in this country.

Last year, for the 50th anniversary of this prophetic speech, many of the leading thinkers and activists on U.S. militarism and war-making came together for a conference to take stock of how this complex has evolved and what can be done to reign it in. For those who weren’t able to attend, author and activist David Swanson has just published The Military Industrial Complex at 50, an edited collection of the insightful and inspiring remarks that were delivered at this timely event, in addition to several other complimentary essays.

The Defense Department has identified the four Marines who urinated on dead Taliban soldiers in an infamous video that turned up this week. The military may charge the Marines with war crimes, though a final decision has not been made.

“Hell and Back Again” Danfung Dennis’ hypnotic, compelling documentary follows the return of a badly injured Marine from Afghanistan, inter-cutting footage from the battlefield with scenes from 25-year old Sgt Nathaniel Harris’ life back in North Carolina.

When Barack Obama ran for president he promised to respect the states’ medical marijuana laws. But since taking office Obama has been steadily using more and more parts of the federal government to wage a war on medical marijuana.

In a series of recent articles, I’ve pointed out Yoo, Bybee, and later Office of Legal Counsel attorney Stephen Bradbury, disregarded internal SERE documents related to the safety of waterboarding. Now we can add the suppression of complaints by SERE trainees of having contracted PTSD from participation in SERE training. This directly contradicts the Yoo/Bybee contention in the Aug. 2, 2002 memo to Rizzo, where they wrote, “Through your [i.e., CIA] consultation with various individuals responsible for such training, you have learned that these techniques have been used as elements of a course of conduct without any reported incident of prolonged mental harm.”

On this Memorial Day, I hope and wish that all our soldiers now at home and those who’ll come home soon can expect the same. Remember them, and remember that they need you now and for a very long time to come.

Don’t let the subject matter of this book throw you off — this is much more than a true-crime book about a gruesome murder-suicide in post-Katrina New Orleans. The actual murder-suicide is the least of what this book is about. It is the story of undiagnosed and untreated PTSD, Katrina, the failures of the American safety net, the ever-increasing violence in post-Katrina New Orleans as the city struggles to survive, and the writing of the story itself. All of these intersect at the crossroads of these deaths. Ethan talked to those who knew Zackery Bowen and Addie Hall, their family, friends, co-workers, and the soldiers Zack served with — to try to find out the why.